Alyssa's posterior arrival (long!)

[SammyRo]

I thought before I post my DS's birth story, I'd add my DD's - it was a case of 2 very different births!

The birth story of Alyssa Grace Roach, born 8.15am, 4/6/08


I woke up about 1.15am on the Tuesday morning, with a feeling of dampness between my legs. As I stood up, my waters seemed to gush out, so as I ran to the toilet, I shouted “Dan, I think my waters just broke!” I put on just a normal pad, but quickly found out that they wouldn’t be absorbent enough, so I had to break into my post baby pack of super thick surfboards. I tried to go back to sleep, but within an hour, I had some contractions that were getting too strong to lie down with, so I had to get up. Unfortunately, the contractions slowed up completely. I tried to lie down again and slept for an hour, but again the contractions started up. About 5 am, I gave up and had a shower.

DH got moving about 8am – he slept fine – and called in sick to work, as we assumed that by the afternoon, I’d be off to hospital and we hoped by that evening we would be holding our baby. The baby had other plans though.

I spoke to the midwife about 9am, and told her that contractions hadn’t got under way. We decided that if contractions hadn’t got going by the afternoon, that we would meet her at the hospital to get checked out and discuss our course of action. In the meantime, I spent plenty of time on the fitball and walking. As I was walking, the contractions got stronger again, and about 8 mins apart, but once I sat down for lunch, they stopped. We got in the car to head to the hospital, and packed the bag in the boot (wishful thinking). I had a couple of contractions in the car, but at the hospital they stopped again. We talked to the midwife, who was aware of our wish to avoid intervention, and she was willing to leave us up to 4 days before we had to have an induction, providing everything stayed good. Although, my cervix had shortened out, so she was hopeful that we would be back that evening. So, off we went home, with instructions to take my temp every 4 hours and some temazipan and Panadol forte to help me get some sleep.

We sat down to watch some dvds, and by about 5pm, the contractions started picking up again. Luckily, this time they didn’t stop. I took the temazipan to try and get some sleep, but the contractions were too strong so I just made myself very drowsy. By midnight, I wouldn’t let Dan go too far as they were coming about every 4-6 mins and were getting longer in duration and stronger. I decided it was time to call the midwife who came for a visit and was happy with my progress. Even though the plan was to stay at home for as long as possible, I was ready to go to hospital. In all honesty, despite my desire for no pain relief, I was thinking of asking for pethidine so I could just sleep. I was also worried about coping with the contractions in the car.

We arrived at the hospital at 2 and got admitted. We went up and met our midwife in the birthing centre, along with a first year student midwife w. She had already got the bath running and helped us get set up with music and aromatherapy, and got me leaning over a bean bag so I could rest in between contractions. As contractions got stronger, we tried the bath, kneeling on the bed and standing. I got the feeling to push about 4.30 am, but got told I couldn’t as I wasn’t dilated enough. The midwife suggested gas to get me through the contractions at this stage and to distract me from pushing. After a while, this wasn’t working, and I kept telling my hubby to f*** off, when he told me I couldn’t push. The midwife made me get in the shower and try some other positions to try and get me not to push.

Luckily, about 5.30, the midwife told me it was time to push, and that’s when the real fun started! I was expecting that by 6am, the bub would be out, but again, this baby had other plans. The desire to push was so strong, and I was groaning and screaming through each one. I thought I was so weak, because of all the noise I was making. The gas had long gone out the window and I was doing it all natural. I was on all fours on the bed and hubby and the midwife kept telling me they could see the head – to which I told them to stop lying to me. I can’t remember the time, but the midwife got me to turn over and sat me up, with a mirror in front of me, so that I could see our progress. Eventually, I could see the head, except it would appear briefly, and then disappear back in – it was motivating to see the head, but it was also frustrating to see it not make any progress or so it seemed. The midwife continued to monitor the baby and there was no sign of distress. At one point, I asked if she could just pull it out – she told me that I would have to move down to the delivery unit, wait for a doc and then have a vontouse, by which time I would have given birth anyway, so I just gritted my teeth and pushed harder. Eventually, more and more of the head would appear each time, and the midwife realised that this baby had decided to see where it was going and make its appearance face first - it turned out she posterior, which we hadn’t suspected. Whilst the baby had been lying on my side the previous week, she wasn’t fully posterior and we assumed that she had turned during labour, which she had, just the wrong way! The midwife hadn’t been able to tell on examination either, mainly due to the swelling on her head.

Finally I got to the last couple of pushes, and the head came out, followed quickly by the body. It was 8.15 and I had been pushing and in absolute agony for about 2 and a half hours.

The midwife picked up the baby and popped her on my stomach, at which point I noticed the huge swelling on the front of the babies head – I thought she had a tumour or something! I’ve since found out that the midwife hadn’t seen a swelling that big before, and another midwife told me it’s the sort of swelling you only get with vontouse.

The cord was also around the babies neck, so the midwife asked the student to press the call button, and within seconds, the room went from dimly lit with only 3 other people, to bright lights and what seemed like 50 people in blue scrubs (it was probably only 10 at the most). The baby was quickly taken off for oxygen and our midwife dealt with me. At this point nobody had told me the sex of the baby, which I kept asking but I think they were all a bit busy. Shortly after the baby had been taken off, I had a sudden blood loss which concerned the midwife. Because of this and the length of time I was pushing, the midwife recommended that I have the syntocin to birth the placenta. After a while she got a doctor to take a look and help deliver the placenta. I remember the doctor telling me to push, and I told her that I was pushing – she said not enough. I remember thinking that I’d just been pushing for what seemed like forever and there was nothing left in me. But even with my ‘weak’ pushing, she managed to deliver the placenta in just 2 pushes. At this point, Dan came running in to tell us that she was a girl and she was beautiful. Because the birthing centre rooms didn’t have resus facilities, she had been taken across the corridor and I made Dan go with her. I was vaguing in and out at this point.

After about 15 minutes, Dan walked in holding our precious girl and handed her to me. The swelling had gone down and she was left with a dark purple bruise on her forehead, but it definitely looked a lot less scary. The paeditrician came in and explained that they wanted her to go down to the nursery just for observations so after a quck cuddle, she was placed in a humidicrib and off she went.

Luckily, my perineum didn’t tear, I think because she had taken such a long time to come out and the head would pop in and out that this stretched my perineum nicely. I did however need a couple of internal stitches, so had to have a local anaesthetic which is when the gas came in really handy. Once they had finally finished, I went to sit up and wanted to head to the nursery, but I was still too woozy. The lovely student midwife went and made me a cup of tea and some toast, which was great, and our midwife came in to say that she had heard from the nursery and Alyssa was coming back up within 15 minutes. They had cleared her to room in with me on the post natal ward. As I sat there eating my toast, Dan walked in, wheeling our baby in a normal bassinette, and handed her to me, so I could finally get a proper hold.

The labour itself was absolutely as we had planned, with no pain relief (except a touch of gas) and a wonderfully supportive midwife, who encouraged me to deal with the contractions by moving around. Dan was also so supportive and never really left my side. Apparently, he had gone to the toilet a couple of times, but I didn’t notice, because he would be right back for the next contraction. I wouldn’t have got through the whole thing without him there.

Wow, sorry I didn't realise it was sooooo long!! If you made it this far, well done!! lol!